Terms of Service - CloudSearch

The gist

We (the folks at gnowsis.com) run a online cloud search Service called "Refinder® CloudSearch".  We make this Service available to you. It is available in a free version and in Paid Accounts. You can quit anytime. Payment is monthly. In no case will we refund fees.

We also provide other services (for example, "Refinder® for Teams"), which have their own terms.

The Refinder® CloudSearch Service is designed to give you a simple way to search your data and as much control as possible over what you index. Your Content is securely stored on our servers and private by default and we will keep your secrets. You authorize us to backup your Content and process it, and to algorithmically analyze it to optimize the Service.

We and others offer Plugins and an API so that you can access Refinder® CloudSearch from other applications. By activating a Plugin, you authorize us to pass your Content to the Plugin provider as needed by them to make it work.

The Service is provided "as is" and "as available", we disclaim all warranties of any kind and take no liability for damages due to the use of the service or loss of your Content.

These Terms of Service are published under an Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license . We want to provide you with comparable, easy to understand terms. They are based on the Wordpress terms published under an Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license, and adapted by Freemix. Irene Fialka from INiTS.at and Georg S Mayer from UrbaneLawyers.at helped us to adapt them. This means you are more than welcome to repurpose them for your own use, just make sure to publish your terms under the same license, and replace references to us with ones to you. Also you must link to this Agreement, the freemix.com terms, and the Wordpress terms somewhere on your site to give attribution.

This version is published on 20.1.2013.

Definitions

we, us, Gnowsis

Gnowsis e.U. Leopold Sauermann, Graumanngasse 7b/5.Stock, A-1150 Vienna, Austria. www.gnowsis.com

you

A natural or legal person entering this contract

Content

Text or other data stored on the Service. See "Content Terms"

Service

The Refinder® CloudSearch Service offered at the getrefinder.com web site and API services you consume as a product by us.

Agreement

This "getrefinder.com Terms of Service" Agreement.

Account

Your Account at the Service. It can be a Free or Paid Account.

Plugin, Connector

A product provided to you by Gnowsis or by third parties on top of the Service.

Privacy Policy

Part of the Agreement defining how Content is handled by us.

Terms of Service:

The following terms and conditions govern all use of the Service and all Content and products available at or through the website www.getrefinder.com, including, but not limited to, the Refinder Paid Accounts (taken together, the "Service").

The Service is owned and operated by us. The Service is offered subject to your acceptance without modification of the terms and conditions contained herein and all other operating rules, policies (including, without limitation, Gnowsis' Privacy Policy) and procedures that may be published from time to time on the Service by Gnowsis, all of which taken together represent your agreement with Gnowsis (collectively, this "Agreement").

Please read this Agreement carefully before accessing or using the Service. By accessing or using any part of the Service, you will be deemed to have accepted the most recent Terms of Service and be a party to a legally binding contract with us. If you reject our Terms of Service you do not have any right to access or use our Service. If these terms and conditions are considered an offer by Gnowsis, acceptance is expressly limited to these terms.

You may wish to save a copy of these Terms of Service for your records.

Account Terms.

§ 1. Service Description. The Service consists of products, computer programs, services and web sites hosted or made available by us, which you may use for searching content on multiple computer and network platforms, now known or hereafter developed (collectively, the "Service").

§ 2. Use of Service. Subject to the terms and conditions within these Terms of Service, Gnowsis grants you a limited, non-exclusive, license to utilize the Service. The Service is available to (a) individuals as long as they are of legal age to form a binding contract and (b) to companies.

§ 3. Your getrefinder.com Account. Use of the service is always based on the creation of an account. If you create an account on the Service, you will be provided with an account designation, a username, password and/or an email address to access or use the Service. Accounts registered by "bots" or other automated methods are not permitted.

§ 4. You agree to provide true, accurate, current and complete information about yourself as prompted by the Service's registration form, and to maintain these data accurate, current and complete.

§ 5. The Services and the Account are not transferable. Under your account you are the sole user of the Service and your account may only be used by you in person.

Responsibilities under your Refinder Account.

§ 6. You are responsible for all activity occurring under your account. You shall abide by all applicable local, state, national and foreign laws, treaties and regulations in connection with your use of the Service, including those related to data privacy, international communications and the transmission of technical or personal data. In addition, you shall be responsible for abiding by any and all internal policies, procedures and regulations, which are required, by your employer and/or the applicable administrators of your account.

§ 7. You are fully liable for the legality of all Content stored on the Service and, in addition, fully liable, if such Content is infringing upon third party rights, and you accordingly agree to indemnify Gnowsis for all claims and losses related to such infringement and/or illegality.

§ 8. You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your Account Information and, accordingly, will be fully responsible for all activities that occur under your account, including activities of others to whom you have provided your Account Information. We will not be liable for any loss or damage arising from your failure to provide us with accurate information or to keep your Account Information secure.

§ 9. You agree to immediately notify Gnowsis of any unauthorized use of your password or account or any other breach of security. Gnowsis cannot and will not be liable for any loss or damage arising from your failure to comply with this paragraph or any other terms and conditions of this Agreement.

§ 10. You are solely responsible for obtaining the equipment and telecommunication services necessary to access the Service, and all fees associated therewith (such as computing devices and Internet service provider and airtime charges).

Content Terms

§ 11. Your Content. With "Content" we identify data (documents, text, graphics, etc.) that is indexed by the Service for you.

§ 12. You acknowledge and agree that you are fully liable for the legality of all content introduced, originated or stored using the Service. You agree that you are responsible for your own conduct and all conduct under your account, and all Content that is created, transmitted, stored or displayed by anyone using your Account Information with the Service and for any consequences arising as a result thereof.

§ 13. You agree to use the Service only for purposes that are legal, proper and in accordance with these Terms of Service and all applicable laws and regulations in the relevant legal jurisdictions (including, without limitation, laws and regulations relating to the recording of audio, copyright laws, privacy laws and the storage and transmission of data and technology).

§ 14. Without limiting the foregoing, you shall be deemed to represent and warrant to Gnowsis that you have the unrestricted legal rights and authority to permit you to submit your Content to Refinder in connection with your use of the Service, and such submission and the grant to Gnowsis of the rights you grant herein in connection with Gnowsis´ offering and operation of the Service does not infringe the rights of any person or third party.

§ 15. You remain in title of your content. We have only limited rights to use your content: we store and backup your content, and process it to improve the service (see the Privacy Policy). Your profile and content remain yours.

§ 16. No Backup of Content. As your content is only indexed in the Service and your primary store of the content is elsewhere, Gnowsis does not keep a backup of your indexed data. In case of data loss, we will re-index your content. To speed this process up, we may make backups of parts of your content.

§ 17. Liability for Content. You understand and agree that the Service and all Gnowsis Services are provided "AS-IS" and that Gnowsis, its affiliates, contractors, suppliers and licensors assume no responsibility for the timelines, deletion, misdelivery or failure to store any of your Content or communications.

§ 18. Security and Confidentiality of Content. From our employees and contractors, only system administrators and contractors authorized for system administration tasks have access to your Content. Access is regulated and restricted to system administration tasks such as making backups of data. We are contracting third party suppliers for hosting our servers. Your data is hosted in the European Union. Our contractors are not allowed to look at nor read, nor use your Content for their own purpose, which is enforced using software security measures. We do not pass your Content to third parties unless you authorize us to do so by using third party Plugins. Read our Privacy Policy for details how you can give third parties access to your Content.

§ 19. Deletion of Content. If you delete Content, Gnowsis will use reasonable efforts to remove it from the Service, but you acknowledge that caching or references to the Content may not be made immediately unavailable.

§ 20. Authorization of Gnowsis to Transform and Process Content. As part of managing your Content, the software running the Service will transform your Content to different technical formats. Content may be summarized for visualization purposes. Content will be analyzed automatically to provide recommendation and search features for you. The Privacy Policy applies.

§ 21. You understand that the technical processing and transmission of the Service, including your Content, may be transferred unencrypted and involve transmissions over various networks.

§ 22. Responsibility of Service Visitors. Gnowsis has not reviewed, and cannot review, all of the material, including computer software, posted to the Service, and cannot therefore be responsible for that material's content, use or effects. By operating the Service, Gnowsis does not represent or imply that it endorses the material there posted, or that it believes such material to be accurate, useful or non-harmful. You are responsible for taking precautions as necessary to protect yourself and your computer systems from viruses, worms, Trojan horses, and other harmful or destructive content. The Service may contain content that is offensive, indecent, or otherwise objectionable, as well as content containing technical inaccuracies, typographical mistakes, and other errors. The Service may also contain material that violates the privacy or publicity rights, or infringes the intellectual property and other proprietary rights, of third parties, or the downloading, copying or use of which is subject to additional terms and conditions, stated or unstated. Gnowsis disclaims any responsibility for any harm or damages resulting from the use of the Service, or from any downloading of content there made available.

§ 23. Content Posted on Other Websites. We have not reviewed, and cannot review, all of the material, including computer software, made available through the websites and webpages to which getrefinder.com links, and that link to getrefinder.com. Gnowsis does not have any control over those non-getrefinder.com websites and webpages, and is not responsible for their contents or their use. By linking to a non-getrefinder.com website or webpage, Gnowsis does not represent or imply that it endorses such website or webpage. You are responsible for taking precautions as necessary to protect yourself and your computer systems from viruses, worms, Trojan horses, and other harmful or destructive content by visiting such website or webpages. Gnowsis disclaims any responsibility for any harm or damages resulting from your use of non-getrefinder.com websites and webpages.You acknowledge that a variety of Refinder actions may impair or prevent you from accessing your Content or using the Service at certain times and/or in the same way, for limited periods or permanently, and agree that Gnowsis has no responsibility or liability as a result of any such actions or results, including, without limitation, for the deletion of, or failure to make available to you, any Content.

Fees and Paid Accounts

§ 24. Fees and Paid Accounts. The Service is offered in different pricing models; please refer to the price list for the current Paid Account models. Different periods of Paid Account usage with different prices are offered, you sign up for a period and pricing model (the "Paid Account Plan"). By selecting a Paid Account Plan you agree to pay Gnowsis the respective one-time fees and periodical subscription fees indicated for that Service Plan. Payments will be charged on the day you sign up for a model and will cover the use of that service for the respective period as indicated.

§ 25. Account Reseller. We are partnering with SaaSy, a Fastspring company, for selling you Paid Accounts. SaaSy employes certified security methods. You will be asked to provide your personal information to SaaSy for payment reasons. SaaSy will not disclose your personal information unless stated in their privacy policy.

§ 26. No Refunds. Account fees are not refundable.

§ 27. Switching the Paid Account Plan. You can change your Paid Account Plan anytime. A new period starts the day you switch. You have to pay the full fee for the new Paid Account on the day you switch. If you are unsure about which model to chose, start with a monthly period and switch after a month.

§ 28. Continuation of Paid Services. At the end of a period of using a Paid Account, the Paid Account is automatically continued with the same model and period and a new fee is invoiced.

§ 29. Cancelling. A Paid Account can be canceled by you any time. The Paid Account is not automatically continued in case you cancel it 14 days before the next period starts. In case our billing partners allow shorter cancelling periods, the cancellation period may be less than 14 days.

§ 30. Changes. Gnowsis reserves the right to change the payment terms and fees upon thirty (30) days prior written notice to you. If you disagree with changed terms, you must cancel the service.

Support and Quality Of Service

§ 31. News by Gnowsis. If you have an Account and have supplied your email address, you explicitly agree that Gnowsis may occasionally send you an email to tell you about new features, solicit your feedback, or just keep you up to date with what's going on with Gnowsis and our Products. We primarily use our various product blogs to communicate this type of information, so we expect to keep this type of email to a minimum.

§ 32. Support. Subscribing to a Refinder Account includes access to online support. Using our online support you can make support requests for technical assistance by using an online forum. We will take reasonable efforts to respond within a certain timeframe, but are not oblidged to do so. You acknowledge and agree that your support requests do not contain confidential or proprietary information; that Gnowsis is not under any obligation of confidentiality express or implied, with respect to the support requests.

§ 33. Feedback. When you give feedback about the Service to improve it, you give Gnowsis the right to unlimitedly use your Contributions freely. Your feedback can come via email or via one of the online feedback mechanisms, we are open for it on all channels including social media. We love your ideas, bug reports, proposals, etc. (collectively called "Contributions"). We reserve the right to publish your Contributions in order to help us clarify or respond to your request or to support other users.You acknowledge and agree that your Contributions do not contain confidential or proprietary information; that Gnowsis is not under any obligation of confidentiality express or implied, with respect to the Contributions. Furthermore you acknowledge and agree, that you are not entitled to any compensation of any kind from Gnowsis under any circumstances for your Contributions. Under no circumstances you will acquire any intellectual property rights in the Service by giving feedback.

§ 34. Quality of Service. Gnowsis gives no guarantee on the quality neither on the availability of the Service. The Service is provided "as is" and "as available". In case the Service is not available, for which reason so ever, Paid Account fees are not refundable.

§ 35. Service Modifications. We retain the right, at our sole discretion, to implement limits to the nature or size of storage available to you, the number of transmissions and email messages, the nature or size of any index or library information, the nature of, or your continued ability to access or distribute, your Content and other data, and impose other limitations at any time, with or without notice.

§ 36. Uptime. For your information: Our internal quality requirements are that the service is available at all times ("24/7") for all Accounts. However, there are many components making the service work, starting with the server hardware and ending with the web browser you are using. We try to remove problems we can influence and give you recommendations (see Support) how to circumvent problems that are out of our influence.

§ 37. Handling of Defects. The Software running the Service is not guaranteed to be error-free. It may contain defects - for example a feature may not work as described in the product description. These defects will, once reported by you or another user or found by internal testing, be repaired by Gnowsis or parts of the Software replaced or removed. Gnowsis cannot guarantee a certain timeline to repair defects.

Plugins By Third Parties

§ 38. Plugins. Third parties can provide their own products on top of our Service. These are called Plugins to our Service. This enables others to offer you interesting features for our Service and stimulates innovation. By using a third-party Plugin, you enter an agreement with the third party. We are not at all liable for third-party Plugins. Please refer to the terms of service of the third party for availability, security, and privacy guidelines of their Plugin.

§ 39. Access to your Content via the API. You can give Plugins access to your Content. The Service has an application programmer interface (API) which lets third parties communicate with the Service to read and write your Content.

§ 40. Authorization. Third parties can only access your Content if you authorize them. The Service offers configuration options to authorize third parties and revoke such authorization. Once you authorize a third party to access your Content, you authorize us to share your Content with the third party. Our Privacy Policy applies.

Account Termination

§ 41. Continuation or Termination of Paid Services. The right to use the Service depends on prompt and timely payment of the Service. Non-payment or delay in payment shall terminate any right of use granted to you under this Agreement. In case the automatic invoices of a Paid Account fail to be paid, the Paid Account is not continued and the contract ends. A Paid Account can be canceled by you any time. The Paid Account is not automatically continued in case you cancel it 14 days before the next period starts (refer to §18).

§ 42. If you wish to terminate this Agreement or your getrefinder.com account, you may close your Account any time. You can only cancel the Account via the Service.

§ 43. If you are not using a Paid Account, Gnowsis may terminate your access to all or any part of the Service at any time, with or without any reason, with or without notice, effective immediately.

§ 44. If you have a Paid Account, such account can only be terminated by Gnowsis (a) if you materially breach this Agreement and fail to cure such breach within fourteen (14) days from Gnowsis's notice to you thereof, (b) if you fail to pay for the subscribed Service within fourteen (14) days after invoicing or (c) if you have cancelled the Service.

§ 45. Gnowsis can terminate the Service for all Accounts as part of a general shut down of our Service. If this occurs, it will be announced in advance. In this case, the periodical subscriptions will be cancelled automatically. Paid Account fees are not refundable. You agree that we shall not be liable to you or to any third party for any modification, suspension or discontinuance of any part of the Service.

§ 46. Upon termination of your Account, your Content is deleted and cannot be recovered. Gnowsis may offer an export service via our API for you to receive a copy of your latest Content.

§ 47. All provisions of this Agreement which by their nature should survive termination shall survive termination, including, without limitation, ownership provisions, confidentiality, warranty disclaimers, indemnity and limitations of liability.

Copyright and Intellectual Property

§ 48. Intellectual Property. This Agreement does not transfer any Gnowsis or third party intellectual property from Gnowsis to you, and all rights, title and interest in and to such property will remain solely with Gnowsis.

§ 49. Trademarks. Gnowsis®, Refinder® getrefinder.com, the getrefinder.com logo, and all other trademarks, service marks, graphics and logos used in connection with getrefinder.com, or the Service are trademarks or registered trademarks of Gnowsis or Gnowsis' licensors. Other trademarks, service marks, graphics and logos used in connection with the Service may be the trademarks of third parties. Your use of the Service grants you no right or license to reproduce or otherwise use any Gnowsis or third-party trademarks.

§ 50. Restrictions on the Gnowsis Software. You may not reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble any Software provided by Gnowsis. Gnowsis or his licensors are entitled to all copyrights and other intellectual property rights on the agreed services (programs, documentation, etc.). By this contract you acquire merely the authorization to use the Service. Further distribution of the Service by you is hereby prohibited, as it is by copyright law. The look and feel of the user interface of our Service is our intellectual property and our copyright. We reserve all rights in the user interface. You may not copy or reuse any part of the user interface (including but not limited to color scheme, visual arrangement, CSS, HTML, labels and texts). Gnowsis' will take any legal measure available to defend his copyright or other intellectual property.

§ 51. Approved Reuse of Gnowsis Software, Trademark, and Graphics. You have our approval to make screenshots or videos of the software and publish them for illustrational and journalistic purposes, such as blog posts or articles, if you add a link to our website www.gnowsis.com and/or www.getrefinder.com and give attribution. You can also verbally cite parts of the Service in journalistic and scientific environments, if you give attribution. For such purposes, you can also use our logos, photos, screenshots, and colors, provided that you do not modify them. For your convenience, there is a press kit available on our homepage.

General Conditions

§ 52. Changes. Gnowsis reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to modify or replace any part of this Agreement. Registered users will be informed of such changes via e-mail and can at any time decide to terminate their Account. Your continued use of or access to the Service following the posting of any changes to this Agreement constitutes acceptance of those changes. In any event, be sure to regularly check these Terms of Service for any updates or other changes, which shall be legally binding upon you when we post them, whether or not we provide you any other notice of such changes. The then-applicable Terms of Service will be posted at www.getrefinder.com/about/content/terms-service, and we will indicate the effective date of each update at the top of the Terms of Service. Your continued use of the Service after any update will be deemed to represent your consent to be bound by, and agreement with, the new Terms of Service. Gnowsis may also, in the future, offer new features and other products through the Service (including, the release of new tools and resources). Such new features and/or products based on the Service shall be subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement.

§ 53. Disclaimer of Warranties. The Service is provided "as is" and "as available", see "Support and Quality of Service" above. Gnowsis and its suppliers and licensors hereby disclaim to the maximum extent permitted by law all warranties of any kind, express or implied, including, without limitation, the warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. Neither Gnowsis nor its suppliers and licensors, makes any warranty that the Service will be timely, secure or error free or that access thereto will be continuous or uninterrupted or that errors in the software will be corrected. In no case, Gnowsis will refund a Paid Account subscription fee.

§ 54. Risk. You understand and agree that your use of the service is at your sole risk and that you download from, or otherwise obtain Content at your own discretion and risk.

§ 55. Treat. As you're actually reading this, here's a treat for you. We continually try to improve the readability of this TOS and are open for improvements, use our feedback forum to contact us. We are also interested in making TOS easier for you and us to handle and support commonterms.net.

§ 56. Limitation of Liability. In no event will Gnowsis, or its suppliers or licensors, be liable with respect to any subject matter of this agreement under any contract, negligence, strict liability or other legal or equitable theory for: (a) any special, incidental or consequential damages; (b) consequential damages and financial loss; (c) not realized savings; (d) the cost of procurement or substitute products or services; (e) for interruption of use or loss or corruption of data; (f) for any amounts that exceed the fees paid by you to Gnowsis under this Agreement during the twelve (12) month period prior to the cause of action. Gnowsis shall have no liability for any failure or delay due to matters beyond our reasonable control. Liabilities for damages arising from third-party claims against Gnowsis are excluded.

§ 57. The foregoing shall not apply to the extent prohibited by applicable contingent law.

§ 58. General Representation and Warranty. You represent and warrant that (a) your use of the Service will be in strict accordance with the Gnowsis Privacy Policy, with this Agreement and with all applicable laws and regulations (including without limitation any local laws or regulations in your country, state, city, or other governmental area, regarding online conduct and acceptable content) and (b) your use of the Service will not infringe or misappropriate the intellectual property rights of any third party.

§ 59. Indemnification. You agree to indemnify and hold harmless Gnowsis, its contractors, and its licensors, and their respective directors, officers, employees and agents from and against any and all claims and expenses, including attorneys' fees, arising out of your use of the Service, including but not limited to your violation of this Agreement.

§ 60. Jurisdiction. Except to the extent applicable law, if any, provided otherwise, this Agreement, any access to or use of the Service will be governed by the laws of Austria. This agreement shall be governed by the laws of Austria. This is the case also when the order is carried out outside of Austria.

§ 61. All disputes arising out of or in connection with the present contract shall be finally settled under the Rules of Arbitration of the International Chamber of Commerce by one or more arbitrators appointed in accordance with the said Rules. Appropriate supplementary provisions: a) the place of arbitration shall be ICC Austria - International Chamber of Commerce; b) the substantive law of Austria shall be applicable; c) the language to be used in the arbitral proceedings shall be German or English.

§ 62. Miscellaneous. The Terms of Service constitutes the entire agreement between you and Gnowsis and govern your use of the Service, superceding any prior agreements between you and Gnowsis (including, but not limited to, any prior versions of the Terms of Service)., and they may only be modified by a written amendment signed by an authorized executive of Gnowsis, or by the posting of a revised version by Gnowsis on the Gnowsis and/or Refinder website.If any part of this Agreement is held invalid or unenforceable, that part will be construed to reflect the parties' original intent, and the remaining portions will remain in full force and effect. A waiver by either party of any term or condition of this Agreement or any breach thereof, in any one instance, will not waive such term or condition or any subsequent breach thereof.

§ 63. You agree that, except as otherwise expressly provided in this Agreement, there shall be no third-party beneficiaries to this Agreement.

§ 64. You may assign your rights under this Agreement to any party that consents to, and agrees to be bound by, its terms and conditions; Gnowsis may assign its rights under this Agreement without condition. This Agreement will be binding upon and will inure to the benefit of the parties, their successors and permitted assigns.